No Midweek service on July 1st. We will resume midweek Holy Eucharist on Wednesdays at 5:30 in the chapel on July 8th with Rev. Arnold Hearn officiating.

FELLOWSHIP NEWS:

PASTORAL NEWS:

St. John’s Good Samaritans (ECW): Please feel free to call Maureen Jones (404-697-7197) or Jeannie Turley (870-816-6387) if you are in need of some help with errands or transportation or food, or if you would just like some company. These and other members of the church have graciously offered their time to assist anyone needing help. If you would like to volunteer services, please let Maureen or Jeannie know.

Angels of Grace–The item from their wish list this week is toiletries for women and children for the women’s shelter. Please place you items in the plastic tub at the stair landing just outside the chapel coming up from the undercroft. Our tub is rather empty now.

CHURCH OFFICE NEWS and ANNOUNCEMENTS:

Sunday duties:

Acolyte –Mike Fielder

Worship Leader–Jack Myers

Midweek no service

Altar Guild –Angie Fielder and Jayne Morris

Altar Flowers –Mrs. Frank Jeffet

POLISH DAY:Team 3 (Angie’s team) on Saturday, June 27th at 10:00 am.

A LITURGICAL TIDBIT:

We have entered what is called “Ordinary Time” on our church calendar. It is the time between Trinity Sunday and the First Sunday in Advent. It is called this because we focus on the ordinary daily life of Christ and his teachings in the readings. We have gone through his birth, temptation, entry into Jerusalem, Crucifixion and Resurrection. The readings will reflect his teachings and parables. It is when we use the word “PROPER” often.

What is a “Proper”? Generally the Propers is the collection of scripture lessons, the collect and preface on Sunday morning. The lectionary guides us to the scripture lessons of the day. The collects (or prayer of the day) can be found in the Book of Common Prayer (BCP) on pages 245 to 261 and it is based upon the season and the Sunday readings. The Proper Preface, is found in the BCP on pages 377-381 and it is part of the Eucharistic Prayer and it is guided by the liturgical season or occasion of the Holy Eucharist. Together the lessons, collects and preface are termed as a group as the “Propers” of the day.

Some seasons of the church year it is easy to identify the Proper. Advent for example has four Sundays, so each Proper for Sunday has the same number in its name as the Sunday, i.e., Advent 1, Advent 2, etc.

Pentecost however offers us a challenge because it can be as short as 25 Sundays, or as long as 29 Sundays. This happens because Easter can be as early as mid-March or late in May. Since Pentecost follows 50 days after Easter it can stretch either longer or shorter on our calendar depending on Easter’s date. Thus the Sundays after Pentecost are counted as 1st, 2nd, 3rd, Sunday after Pentecost while the Proper might start the season skipping the first several Sundays because of a late Pentecost. June 7th 2015, for example is the 2nd Sunday after Pentecost, Proper 5, skipping Propers 1-4 so we can end Pentecost in time for Advent, the four Sundays before Christmas. This sequence of counting will continue in 2015 ending on November 22, on the 26th Sunday of Pentecost Proper 29. All of this is very confusing, but I wanted to try and explain why the number for the Sunday after Pentecost and the number for the Proper do not match.